A Balanced Angle: Laura Ingraham ‘85 Speaks at Dartmouth

Laura Ingraham ’85 re­turned to campus Febru­ary 25 for an open forum Q&A hosted by the Dart­mouth Political Union (DPU), her first speech on campus as an alumna. Despite the best efforts of a small but vocal group of protesters, the event went off without a hitch and In­graham was able to rem­inisce about her time as a student at Dartmouth, provide advice to students, and take some questions from the audience.

The overwhelming theme of Ingraham’s mes­sage was how blessed she was to be able to at­tend Dartmouth College, and how we as students should not take this time for granted. A synop­sis of Ingraham’s time at Dartmouth would not be complete without men­tioning her foundation­al role at The Dartmouth Review, where she served as the first female Edi­tor-in-Chief. This event was no exception, and Ingraham discussed mul­tiple instances directly related to her role in the Review.

Despite claiming to have no interest in be­ing involved in politics when she got to Dart­mouth, that seems to have changed quickly after In­graham discovered the just-formed Dartmouth Review in 1981, short­ly after ld Reagan’landslide election. At The Review, Ingraham quick­ly got involved in writing course guides and professor reviews, in addition to more topical issues like investigating administrative funding and polling sentiment regarding naval ROTC reinstatement. As she put it, Ingraham and her fellow Review correspondents quickly “became pariahs,” but didn’t think of themselves that way.

In response to The Dart­mouth Review, Dartmouth College pushed back aggres­sively to crack down on the in­dependent newspaper. Ingra­ham detailed how the college sued The Review for using the name “Dartmouth,” for fund­raising off the publicly acces­sible alumni directory, and more. But this was just a fore­taste of the conflict that was to come.

In 1983, when Laura In­graham was 19 years old, she audited a course, American Music and Oral Tradition. The disputes that would arise be­tween the course’s professor, Prof. William Cole, and Ingra­ham over her reporting on the course have been covered in detail by this publication. The DPU event allowed us to hear Ingraham’s side of the story, all these years later. She described the entire kerfuffle as an “illib­eral chapter in the great histo­ry of this great university.” She was called “every slur in the book” and even harassed in her dorm room by the profes­sor himself!

After her brief recap of her time at Dartmouth, Ingraham concluded with a peroration encouraging students to make the most of their time here. She championed being bold and willing to make mistakes, noting that college is the one time in our lives where it’s excusable to be “full of more vigor than wisdom.” She also urged us to read deeply, say­ing, “Don’t skate on the surface of social media.” By exposing ourselves to new ideas and discussing those ideas freely, we engage in the Western tra­dition of freedom of speech: “The process is to arrive at something more true than you expected before.” 

With her remarks conclud­ed, it came time for Q&A. DPU President Mac Mahoney ’26 started off with some moderat­ed questions before the micro­phones were opened up to the audience. Ingraham touched on the successes of Trump 2.0 (shutting down the border, and paring back on inflation) along with failures (nasty comments like those about Rob Reiner). She also indicated that the way forward for Republicans is to embrace Andrew Jack­son’s populism. Finally, when asked what the political left gets right, Ingraham indicated that they tend to have the best of intentions, like helping the middle class, but often fail on policy that gets them there.

Out of all the audience ques­tions, one stood out as eliciting a particularly humorous re­sponse. A student came to the mic and asked Ingraham why she implored Lebron James to “shut up and dribble” after he criticized President Trump, yet after Drew Brees said he would “never agree with any­body disrespecting the flag”, Ingraham said he was “allowed to have his view.” Why the stu­dent found these comments hypocritical is beyond me, they appear to form a consis­tent viewpoint. However, after the audience laughed when Ingraham said “I don’t partic­ularly remember that remark,” she quipped “You guys have to get out more if you think that’s funny.” The audience also had a good chuckle at a statement she made which I personally haven’t heard for several years now: “The left is such snow­flakes.”

Most other audience ques­tions were made in good faith and got to the core of the gov­ernment’s role in regulating or defending free speech, and the current state of higher educa­tion. Some students attempted gotcha questions surrounding Ingraham’s tenure at The Dart­mouth Review, which she had clearly prepared answers for.

Allow me to conclude with two statements Ingraham made when answering the question about the state of American higher education: “The way to change people’s minds is to talk…If you spend ten minutes with someone you disagree with, you find some­thing to agree on in five min­utes,” and: “Do everything, but do it with joy. One day life will hit you hard, and you’ll wish you were back in Hanover.” Don’t take the time you have here for granted.